antitrust – Vulgar Army

Don’t shoot! I’ll let go!

Udo J. Keppler, Don’t shoot! I’ll let go!, Januaury 31 1914, Illus. in: Puck, v. 75, no. 1926. Reproduced from: The Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2011649666/ (Accessed: 9th March 2013) The cartoon refers to the Clayton Act of 1914, which was an attempt by the Wilson Administration to tighten antitrust laws. Part of the act was to prevent corporations merging that had […]

Its Arms Work All Together Now

Another monopoly octopus from “drafts” folders with no information or notes. I think I may have poached it from Getty Images (just a hunch)… Circa 1920s.

De Groote Olie Octopus

Book cover for “De groote Olie octopus, door Truth onderzocht” (The Great Oil Octopus by Truth Examined)‎. ‎Amsterdam, L.J. Veen. Conflicting dates: first published 1910, reprinted 1925? Dutch Anti-trust/Anti-capitalism criticising oil companies including Esso and Rockefeller. References: Antiqbook, http://www.antiqbook.nl/boox/vvliet/12028.shtml Image Source: International Institute of Social History, Collection: IISG, Call # BG C12/589. (Accessed: 23rd Oct, 2010)

“The End of the Circus Season” by William Allen Rogers published November 3, 1900, in Harper’s Weekly p.1050 Democratic nominee William Jennings Bryan is pictured as a clown dejected by his impending defeat. He rides the exhausted Democratic Donkey through a driving rain storm, while carrying the symbols of his failed issues—free silver (bunco dollar), imperialism […]

C.P Hunting as an Octopus (1896) by Jimmy Swinnerton was published in the San Francisco Examiner, December 14th 18961. The cartoon show an octopoid with trunk like limbs as a head of a bearded man, with C.P. Hunting (Collis Potter) written across its forehead. Huntington was a railway magnate and one of the “big four”2. Each of its […]

The cephalopod – terrestrial devil fish – a monster of centralization (?) (1873) This is the earliest cartoon (1873) in my collection of the octopus as a metaphor for an industry. The presence of the cave, and the timing1 would suggest an Victor Hugo influence. It also precedes the ‘burst’ of octopus cartoons in the1880s […]

Octopus of ‘Monopoly’ by John Tenniel published in Punch, or the London Charivai, November 3rd,1888. The octopus of “Monopoly” attempts to upset the boat of oar-wielding ‘Commerce’ (wearing the winged hat of Hermes or Mercury?). The octopus’s limbs are: ’salt’, ‘iron’, ‘copper’, and ‘cotton’. The boat is called: “Free Competition” (A case of ‘bad’ versus […]

The Forty T—-s (Rogers, 1888) Another octopus antitrust cartoon from Harper’s Weekly. Proof that octopus cartoons can be more imaginative than just putting an octopus on a building or map and tattooing it with whomever you want it to represent. “The Forty T—-s: Baba Jonathon: I don’t like your looks, Mr. Merchant, you had better move […]

Will It Hurt The Octopus? (Walker, 1904) Artist: Ryan Walker, SOURCE (image altered from) July 1904: “Will it Hurt the Octopus?”/”Anxious Teddy”, The Comrade, vol. 3, no. 10, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University,http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/dl_crosscollex/photoneg/oneITEM.asp?pid=39002053601226&iid=5360122&srchtype= (Accessed 04 Jan 2009). Via ZPi

The Puzzled Citizen (Bradley, 1909) “Before the Trojan horse is admitted the puzzled citizen will have to be shown a little more fully” by Luther Daniels Bradley, along with “Hunting the Octopus”, is a personal favourite. It is a play on the Trojan Horse, obviously, with the octopus contorting itself into the shape of a horse. […]